Bitcoin

<h2 id="header-0">Key Facts</h2>
<ul>
 <li>Bitcoin's 30-day average hash rate reached 944.6 EH/s on Oct. 1, its highest since June 13, after falling 19% from its November 2025 peak.</li>
 <li>JPMorgan puts the cost of mining one bitcoin near $85,000 and says trading above it could reduce forced selling by miners.</li>
 <li>Bitcoin traded just below that level at about $84,400 on Oct. 1, and hash rate is still about 15% under its peak as miners rent power to AI firms.</li>
</ul>
Bitcoin's hash rate has climbed to its highest 30-day average since mid-June, ending the deepest pullback in mining power since China's 2021 ban. The recovery now hinges on a price sitting just below the roughly $85,000 JPMorgan estimates it costs to mine one bitcoin.
Miners are adding computing power again as Bitcoin (<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/bitcoin/">BTC</a>) trades back around the cost of producing a coin. JPMorgan analysts said staying above that cost would ease the forced selling by miners that has weighed on the market. Capriole Investments founder Charles Edwards reads the turn as a change in trend, and his firm's records show the same signal has come before large gains.<tweet-embed url="https://x.com/caprioleio/status/2105532544657899953"></tweet-embed>
"We've just exited the biggest Miner Capitulation since China banned Bitcoin mining and killed 50% of the network overnight in 2021," Edwards <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://x.com/caprioleio/status/2105532544657899953">wrote</a> on X. "Hash Rate is seeing its first signs of growth since 2025."
<h2 id="header-1">What Changed for Miners? Bitcoin Returned to Its Production Cost</h2>
Bitcoin spent 280 days below JPMorgan's estimated production cost before last week's rally, analysts led by Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://www.theblock.co/news/markets/2026-09-24-jpmorgan-bitcoin-production-cost-miners-relief-416283">said</a> in a Sept. 23 note.
The analysts said that cost has historically acted as a "soft floor" for the price. Below it, miners with higher power and equipment costs spend more to win each block <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://coinmarketcap.com/academy/glossary/block-reward">reward</a> than the reward is worth. They sell more of their coins, switch machines off or leave <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://coinmarketcap.com/academy/glossary/mining">mining</a> altogether.
The network is now drawing machines back. Bitcoin's mining <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://coinmarketcap.com/academy/glossary/mining-difficulty">difficulty</a> <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://mempool.space/graphs/mining/hashrate-difficulty">rose</a> 4.16% on Sept. 19, its largest increase since June. The protocol resets it about every two weeks to keep new blocks arriving at a steady pace.
<h2 id="header-2">How Deep Was the Slump? The Worst Since China's Ban</h2>
Hash rate measures the computing power miners point at the network. A falling reading means machines are going dark.
Bitcoin's 30-day average hash rate fell about 19% from its November 2025 peak to a low in late July, according to <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://mempool.space/graphs/mining/hashrate-difficulty">data</a> from mempool.space. That was the steepest drop since 2021, when China's ban cut the same measure by about 43%.
Capriole's Hash Ribbons indicator compares one-month and two-month <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://coinmarketcap.com/academy/glossary/moving-average-ma">moving</a> averages of hash rate. It marks a miner capitulation as over when the shorter average climbs back above the longer one. That crossing came on Aug. 27. The shorter average has stayed on top since, its longest run since the slump began in November.
"Of the 9 historic buy signals, the average gain to the next market cycle peak… is over 5000%," Capriole <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://capriole.com/hash-ribbons-bitcoin-bottoms">wrote</a> in its study of the indicator, first published in 2019.
<h2 id="header-3">What Slows the Recovery? Miners Renting Power to AI</h2>
The recovery is partial. Hash rate remains about 15% below its peak. Several of the largest listed miners are also leasing their power to AI companies.<tweet-embed url="https://x.com/cryptoquant_com/status/2102358549393494311"></tweet-embed>
Core Scientific <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1839341/000183934126000014/core-20260630.htm">reported</a> 83% of its second-quarter revenue from colocation services. TeraWulf <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1083301/000108330126000162/a_wulfearningsreleaseq22026.htm">reported</a> 71% from leasing capacity for high-performance computing.
JPMorgan said AI firms pay more per megawatt, and on steadier terms, than mining does. The shift is flattening hash-rate growth, which the analysts said would make Bitcoin's production cost rise more slowly.
<h2 id="header-4">What Would Confirm the Recovery? Bitcoin Holding Above $85K</h2>
Bitcoin traded at $84,422 as of 1:15 p.m. ET, up 0.2% over 24 hours.
Glassnode <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://research.glassnode.com/the-week-onchain-week-39-2026/">places</a> its largest <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://coinmarketcap.com/academy/glossary/resistance-line-level">resistance</a> on the order book at $85,000 to $85,500, the same zone.
The network's next difficulty adjustment is due Saturday.
"To the extent it is sustained, this new backdrop should provide relief to bitcoin miners, thus reducing the risk of forced selling by them," the JPMorgan analysts said.
Further Reading: <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://coinmarketcap.com/academy/article/bitcoin-volatility-3-year-low-options-october">Bitcoin Volatility Hits 3-Year Low as Bitfinex Eyes $95K in October</a>

Bitcoin Hash Rate Climbs Out of Deepest Miner Slump Since 2021

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